Chapter 2 Chapter 1 Leaving Home

Tom stood alone at the back door, feeling wronged and wanting to cry, but he restrained himself.He looked around the garden with a farewell look.He was very angry: why did he have to leave the garden and leave his brother Peter! He had already planned with Peter to have fun in the back garden during the summer vacation. City dwellers generally have small gardens, and Tom's garden is no exception.In his garden.There was a small vegetable patch, a lawn, a flowerbed; and near the back fence, a small patch of uneven ground with three apple trees growing on it.The apple tree was very big, but there were very few apples, so their parents allowed Tom and Peter to climb up the tree and play.They plan to build a small shed on the apple tree during the holidays.

Tom looked longingly at the garden for a while, then turned and went into the house.When he reached the landing, he called upstairs: "Good-bye, Peter!" A hoarse answer came from upstairs: "Good-bye, Tom!" Tom went to the gate and saw his mother waiting for him with the box.He reached for the box, but his mother didn't give it to him right away, but said to him kindly: "You know, Tom, measles is contagious. That's why I sent you away in such a hurry. You don't like it, We don't like it, but we can't help it. Your father and I will miss you, and Peter will miss you. He's got the measles now, and it's his fault."

"I didn't say you were glad I was gone," said Tom, "I just said..." "Hush!" Mom interrupted him softly, looking up at the road.There was a car parked on the road with a man sitting in the driver's seat.She handed the box to Tom and bent over to adjust his tie, which just covered the first button of his shirt.Then leaning close to Tom's ear, he whispered: "Tom, boy, remember, you're a guest there and you must... well, how should I put it? You must be good." Mom kissed Tom and pushed him forward slightly. , followed him towards the car.

Tom got into the car, and his mother said to his uncle in the driver's seat, "Aaron, please say hello to Gwen. Tell her we appreciate you. You came to pick up Tom at the first notice, what a trouble! Tom, Yes or no?" "Hmm!" Tom grunted reluctantly. "Hey, if one person in the family is sick, the place is too small." Mom sighed. "It's a little thing, you're welcome," replied Uncle Allen.He started the engine. Tom rolled down the window on the side of the car near his mother and said, "Goodbye, Mom!" "Oh, Tom!" Mom's lips trembled a little, "I'm sorry I made you unhappy at the beginning of the summer vacation!"

The car started, and Tom turned and yelled, "I'd rather stay home and get the measles with Peter!" Tom waved goodbye to his mother angrily.Then, ignoring the presence of others, he waved to a flushed face pasted behind a glass window in an upstairs bedroom.Mother looked up, threw up her hands resignedly—Peter wasn't supposed to get out of bed—and hurried into the house. Tom closed the window and leaned back in the seat.He was furious and didn't say a word. Uncle Allen cleared his throat and said, "Well, I hope we can get along." It wasn't a question, and Tom didn't bother to answer it.

Tom knew it would be rude of him to do so, but he found an excuse: he didn't like Uncle Allen very much, and didn't intend to like him.In fact, he wished Uncle Allen had been a rough man. He thought about it. "As long as he hits me, I'll run home. At that time, my parents won't say anything about me. Even if the measles patients are quarantined, I don't care. But I know he won't even touch me. And Aunt Gwen was worse, she was good-natured and very fond of children. Well, shut up for weeks in a dead room with Uncle Allen and Aunt Gwen..." Although Tom had never been to Uncle Allen's, he knew that they lived in a flat and had no garden.

Uncle Allen and Tom were silent all the way.It was just that when passing through the city of Erie, the car stopped for a while.Uncle Allen got out of the car and bought Tom a postcard of the steeple of the cathedral in Erie.But his uncle would not let him climb the steeple of the church, Tom was very disappointed.His uncle explained to him: He had been in contact with a measles patient, had the virus, and needed to be isolated; so he could not be allowed to go.Tom could neither be with Peter for fear of getting the measles, nor be in contact with other people for fear that if he had the measles, he would pass it on to others.Uncle Allen and Aunt Gwen had both had measles, so they were not afraid of contagion.

Their car passed through Erie, Finns, and Castleford, and a little further on they arrived at the house of Uncle Allen and Aunt Gwen.This was originally an exclusive building.The residential building was later converted into an apartment building.There are many newer low houses around the building, row upon row, with rows of bay windows, gabled roofs and small pointed attics as far as the eye can see.This ordinary-looking rectangular building stands among the low houses, looking very imposing. Uncle Allen honked the horn and turned onto the driveway in front of the building.In fact, it can no longer be called a motorway because it is too short. "It turns out that the front of this building is worse than it is now." Father Allen Poe said, "Later, a house was built on the opposite side and the road was widened, so it is better to pass by." The car stopped in front of the gate with two pillars.At this time, Aunt Gwen was already standing at the door, smiling happily, she stepped forward and kissed Tom, and then took his hand into the building, followed by Uncle Allen carrying the suitcase.

Tom's feet stepped on the cold slate floor downstairs, and he smelled a dusty smell that had not been cleaned for a long time in his nose.It hasn't been cleaned for years.Tom looked around and shuddered.The hall was neither crude nor ugly, but it made people feel uncomfortable.The lobby is the center of the building's ground floor, running from the front door to the back door.Next to the hall there is a small passage leading to the stairs, forming a T-shape with the hall.The hall was empty, deserted, and lifeless.Someone posted a brightly colored tourist poster on the high gray wall of the hall; someone put a laundry box in the corner with a laundry list on it; a few empty milk bottles were placed by a door a little farther away. bottle and a note to the milkman.It seems that none of these things originally existed in the hall.The whole hall was empty and silent except for the chattering voice of Aunt Gwen, who asked about Tom's mother and Peter's measles and so on.Whenever she stopped, the only sound Tom heard was the ticking of an old-fashioned grandfather clock.

Tom turned to the big clock, and Aunt Gwen said hastily, "Don't touch it, Tom." Then she added, in a low voice, "That clock belongs to old Mrs. Bartholomew upstairs, and she'd rather not have it touched." Tom wanted to open the great clock, but it occurred to him that he might leave it for later, and open it quietly when no one was looking.Of course, there's nothing wrong with just looking at it. He turned around, turned his back to the clock, and continued talking to his aunt as if nothing had happened.While sneaking his hand into the crack of the pendulum door, trying to pry it open with his nails...

"Since Mrs. Bartholomew loves her clock so much, why doesn't she move to her room?" Tom asked, tapping lightly with his fingernails, but the clock door remained motionless... "Because the back of the clock is screwed to the wall, and the screws are rusted," Aunt Gwen replied. "Come on, Tom, let's go upstairs to our tea." "Well!" Tom seemed to have just realized where he was standing.He left the great clock, the door of which appeared to be locked. As they went upstairs, they heard the grand clock strike solemnly. Uncle Allen frowned and made some sharp comments.He said: "This clock is quite accurate. Now the hour hand points to five o'clock, but it only strikes once. It often strikes randomly. It is troublesome to judge the time by listening to its bell. The annoying thing is that the clock The sound can be heard far away, even lying in bed at night can hear the random ringing of bells." The first door on the upper floor was the home of Mrs. and Mrs. Alan Kitson, and the second door used to be the narrow staircase leading to Mrs. Bartholomew's apartment on the top floor.This building and the big clock belong to her.She was the landlord, and the Kitsons and the other residents were her tenants. "This is our home, Tom dear," said Aunt Gwen. "This is the guest room, your bedroom. I've put flowers in it, and a few books for your entertainment." She smiled at Tom with a look that seemed to ask him to like the place. Tom's bedroom had a high ceiling, but it was small.There is also a door on one wall of the room, which looks the same as the door, and the windows are wide and bright.Tom was all about being a polite guest, but... "There are bars under the windows?" cried Tom suddenly. "This is a nursery, and I'm not a nursery!" "Of course not...of course not!" Aunt Gwen explained aloud anxiously. "Those iron railings weren't made for you, Tom. They were there when we moved in, and they were on the bathroom window." But his aunt's words did not quite dispel Tom's suspicions. Tom was left alone in his room to undress before tea.He inspected the room carefully again, and found that the other door was the door of a small clothes closet.The books my aunt brought were for girls, the story books she had read in her childhood about school life.Regardless of Aunt Gwen's explanations, the windows did have iron bars like those found in nurseries. Tom's spirits improved a little over the tea.Aunt Gwen made German county tea, along with boiled eggs, homemade scones, homemade plum jam and whipped cream.She claims to be good at cooking and likes to cook.She was going to cook something nice and treat Tom well. After tea, Tom wrote a letter to his mother, reporting his safe arrival, and enclosed a postcard for Peter, in which he gave an objective description of his situation here. He wrote: "Hope your measles are better. Here's a picture of the cathedral steeple in Erie." Tom knew Peter would be interested, because they both loved climbing church steeples as well as trees. "We were passing through Erie when we came, but Uncle Allen wouldn't let me climb the steeple of the cathedral. They lived in an apartment building with no garden. I still had iron bars on my bedroom windows, and Aunt Gwen said it wasn't for me to install them. Yes. The food here is very good.” When he was done, Tom read it from cover to cover, and decided to put a heavy line under the last sentence, as a sign of respect for Aunt Gwen.The signature is the code: a lanky cat for Tom Lange. Tom was drawing the cat's whiskers when he heard a bell ringing in the hall below.The sound is indeed very clear, you can count how many times it hits. Tom couldn't help laughing smugly when he counted the number, and it turned out to be wrong again, which was completely different from the actual time. ① Another meaning of Tom in English is cat; Lange is a British surname, meaning "long".